Spring melted into early summer, and the train rides got warmer, brighter. Ivy stopped wearing her oversized coat and started tucking wildflowers into her bag—tiny bursts of color that made her smile more than any joke James could come up with.

They started texting after the train. Nothing dramatic. Just check-ins. Memes. Photos of weird clouds. Once, she sent him a blurry shot of her cat with a single caption: Murder in his eyes.

James saved it.

One morning, she didn’t have her journal.

He noticed right away.

“You forget it?” he asked.

She shook her head. “I threw it out.”

“What? Why?”

“It was getting too full of things I didn’t want to carry anymore.”

James looked at her for a long time. “Do you want a new one?”

Ivy smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Maybe later. Right now I’m just trying to feel lighter.”

He didn’t know what to say, so he didn’t say anything. Just reached across the tiny space between them and offered her his hand. She looked at it for a second, then took it.

That was the first time they touched.

And neither of them let go until her stop came.

“I’ll see you tomorrow?” James asked.

“Yeah,” she said, almost like a whisper.

“Again.”